In enjoy reading. That shouldn't really come as a big surprise to anyone. I am a writer after all. I've never really been structured about my reading, though. When it comes to writing, I strive to apply the principles of deliberate practice: praticing with a specific goal in mind, doing target exercises, getting feedback, trying … Continue reading Reading list for 2025
Category: Deliberate Practice
2024 – My Year in Writing and Reading
2025 is well under way already, and it's perhaps a bit late to start looking back at the previous year and how I fared. But, well... it's been a stressful January, and it's only really now that I've had both the time and energy to reflect on 2024. The obvious place to start is probably … Continue reading 2024 – My Year in Writing and Reading
2018 – My Year as a Writer
With another year gone by, it's time to take stocks, summarize what've learned in regards to my writing, and, hopefully, figure out how to push forward. As always, it was a year with ups and downs. I landed my first publication at a professionally paying magazine, Grievous Angel Magazine (which sadly closed down later in … Continue reading 2018 – My Year as a Writer
Confirmation Bias and Self-delussion
Stepping out of your comfort zone, focusing on improving instead of getting praise. That's what drives us to become better artists. I highly recommend this brief article by Jason S. Riddler on confirmation bias, self-delussion, and how those leads to stagnation. It's worth a read to all us would-be writers (and other striving artists as … Continue reading Confirmation Bias and Self-delussion
The Power of Writing Exercises
A couple of weeks ago I started attending a weekly wall climbing workshop at my local climbing hall (stay with me; it'll tie into writing fiction further down). I didn't know what to expected, how we were going to practice, how much feedback we'd get. I wasn't even sure I would learn anything at all … Continue reading The Power of Writing Exercises
A Year of Critical Reading – What I’ve Learned so Far
Psychologist and expert in experts Dr. Anders Eriksson explains in his book, Peak (one of the few self-help books actually worth reading, if you ask me), that the single best indicator of how good a chess player is going to be isn't how many hours of chess they've played but how many hours they've spent … Continue reading A Year of Critical Reading – What I’ve Learned so Far
Why the 10.000 Hour Rule doesn’t Exist
When most people think about deliberate practice, it's probably in the form of the 10.000 hours rule invented by Malcom Gladwell. Hell, a lot of people who've never heard of deliberate practice, or deep practice as it's sometimes called, know the 10.000 hour rule. The rule states that: With 10.000 hours of practice, you can … Continue reading Why the 10.000 Hour Rule doesn’t Exist
Deliberate Practice – July Stats
Already with one day left of the month, July proved to be my best month yet in regards to getting down practice hours. I ended averaging 3.57 hours a day (my previous best was 3.42). The practice consisted of 15 hours of writing exercises, almost 19 hours of writing stories, more than 73 hours of … Continue reading Deliberate Practice – July Stats
Fiction Writing Practice – Quality vs. Quantity
Those of you who have been following the blog for a while will know by now that I'm putting a lot of effort into utilizing deliberate practice to improve my fiction writing skills. For the last couple of month I've been focusing on getting my practice time up, going from practicing on average 1.5 hours … Continue reading Fiction Writing Practice – Quality vs. Quantity
Training Stats – June
It seems I've gotten the hang on the quantitative bit of my practice. June proved my best month yet with more than 102 hours of fiction writing practice. I spent more than 69.5 hours reading, more than an hour visualizing stories, and just about 32 hours spent on doing writing exercises or writing stories. However, … Continue reading Training Stats – June
Toby Backman 